Mega Menger Project

Math + Art + U = Mega Menger

An international celebration of mathematical art

Calvin College has been selected as one of twenty sites worldwide to host a Mega Menger build, with sessions from Oct. 17-28, 2014 (see event details). At each site, a model of a mathematical fractal called a Menger Sponge will be constructed from nearly 70,000 business cards. The resulting sculpture will weigh approximately 170 pounds and stand 4.5 feet tall, 4.5 feet wide and 4.5 feet deep. To find out more about the worldwide Mega Menger event and see updates from sites around the world, visit megamenger.com. You can also read stories about the Calvin build in a Chimes article and in Calvin's News and Stories.

The Menger Sponge

The Menger sponge is formed by repeatedly removing "middle thirds" from a 3-dimensional cube.

Our model will represent 7 levels of this infinite process.

Among the interesting properties of the Menger Sponge:

Its mathematical dimension is actually a little less than 3 -- approximately 2.73.

Get involved

The success of this event depends on volunteers to help with the build. We estimate that the entire project will require approximately 1,000 people hours to complete.

Public build sessions

The public is invited to join Calvin students and alumni at a number of public build sessions. Master builders will be on hand to teach you how to construct individual cubes out of six business cards and to assemble them into larger components. Volunteers are welcome to come for all or any part of a build session.

Thursday, October 16, 2014: 3 pm - 6 pm, in North Hall 259 our Mathematics and Statistics Colloquium will be devoted to a build session.

Resources

STL file for a folding jig (suitable for printing with a 3d printer. Note: scale should be 1 inch, but it sometimes needs to rescaled if your software reads it as mm instead. For US business cards, the equilateral triangle should be about 2.065 inches on a side. The important thing is that it be scaled so that the folds are a touch wider than the business cards so the cards can slide through after folding.)